


Misfit Things

by Feynite



Series: The Bagel AU [3]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Bagel AU, F/M, Slow Build, crackship, what even
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-30
Updated: 2016-03-24
Packaged: 2018-05-04 05:13:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5321765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Feynite/pseuds/Feynite
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Inspired by conversations that led to requests on tumblr - Cassandra and Abelas in the bagel 'verse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Happiness

Abelas contemplates the failed sweet rolls before him.

This is a merciless world. Cold. It takes and it takes, and it offers few comforts in return. The demands are unending. Time has crushed life into compressed shapes and fleeting forms, and artistry, memory, and accomplishment all struggle to simply breathe before they are – without exception – denied even that.

The sweet rolls are inedible. Ingredients wasted on another doomed venture.

He tips them into the trash, and stares at the blank countertop. The air smells of sweet cooking. But it is a lie. There is no bounty here. Not this day, and perhaps not on any day yet to come. Perhaps the soured air of these hasty, modern times has at last turned its final corner, and even the scant comfort of his few working recipes will be denied to him.

Entropy seeps into the shop, as sickly at the electric lights from the street.

The bell rings.

He glances towards the front.

At this late hour, customers are scarce; though not unheard of. He is alone, and had thought to mourn his failures in solitude. But of course, fate will not even permit him that much.

“Why have you disturbed the peace of this shop?” he demands of the interloper, striding out towards the service counter.

Ah.

A human.

One of the women who works in the store across the street. The one which sells bland and uninspired foods; a fitting establishment for the dull grey streets and listless patrons that sustain it. Bright things do not thrive here. Perhaps there is some stray wisdom in accepting that, and meeting the demands of a hollow world with flavourless dishes.

The woman blinks at him. She is dark-haired, fit, with a well-sculpted jaw and a gaze that is somewhat sharper than he expects. Through the windows he sees that the shop across the street has closed for the evening. He realizes it is past closing time for this one, as well; caught up in his fleeting and doomed efforts to restore some scant fragment of the past, he had allowed time to once again escape him.

“Are you closed? The sign said you were open,” the woman mentions.

“We  _should_  be closed. But… I have neglected my duties,” Abelas admits, with a shamed wince. Such paltry duties they are, and yet, he fails them still.

The woman raises her eyebrows.

“Well, you just opened recently. Some hiccups are bound to happen,” she reasons. “Do you need any help?”

“Help?” he wonders. “What help can you offer? You are my enemy. Or an enemy of this shop, at least. And as I have vowed to serve it, we stand in opposition.”

She blinks at him.

“…Forgive me, but I don’t truly think your Orlesian bagel shop is much competition for our Marcher one. We are  _in_  the Free Marches, after all. Solidarity and local pride alone would never allow your business to surpass ours,” the woman declares, with confidence that speaks of experience in such matters.

He frowns at her for a moment.

“Perhaps,” he concedes.

This venture may be as doomed as any other he has undertaken in the long and empty years of his life.

The woman frowns at him. Then she turns, and he thinks she means to leave. It is only the sensible course of action to take. 

Instead, she flips the sign over to ‘closed’ instead of ‘open’, and then strides back towards the counter.

“For starters, I can help with  _that_. Now. What else do you need to do in order to close? Is there any equipment I can help you turn off?” she asks him.

An earnest offer of help.

Or perhaps a would-be saboteur, scenting weakness in the air.

He deliberates for a moment.

“Perhaps you may help,” he concedes, and gives her some of the less delicate tasks left to perform.

She manages them with the deft hand of experience.

He supposes he must concede that though the world might be merciless towards his sweet rolls, it can, at times, throw the rare scrap of relief in his own direction. The tedium of closing is lessened by the simple virtue of company. Even human company. He closes out the cash register and cleans up in the back, while the woman wipes down the crude and unadorned tables in the front. Then he sets the alarm system as they leave.

“Thank you,” he offers.

“It was no trouble,” she replies. “I am Cassandra, by the way.”

“…Abelas.”

~

His employer, the man with the countenance of an old wolf and the memories of a young elf, has a penchant for misfit things. Hardly surprising, all factors considered. The man takes on a spirit-born waif, and himself, of course, and opens his shop in a city notorious for its miasma of despair and modern failings. Cold electric light and dusty, listless air, and cars that run on the remains of long-dead dragons. Monsters fueled by their own kind of sacrificial magic.

Still. It takes him some time to realize what affliction is plaguing this person he could possibly deem a ‘friend’ of sorts, as he regularly slips away during the early morning hours, and returns with a strange beverage clutched in his hand as often as not. Abelas does not think the item holds much appeal. But Solas’ eyes go distant as whenever drinks, and looks through their windows to the shop across the street.

It is not until the misfit proprietor herself turns up on their own doorstep, however, and he sees the man’s reaction to her that he puts two and two together.

Ah.

Of course.

In these racing times, even romantic sentiments move hastily along.

It is a poor match, he thinks. The small, scurrying elven woman, and the old soul with his grand dreams and pure passions. She is inadequate for Solas, who rails against accepting the world’s many failings, and fights to bring a little brightness into the listlessness of it. To restore some of what has been lost. A battle doomed to failure; yet one which, by all appearances, the shop across the street is content to never wage.

She will never keep pace with him.

He is mistaken, as it happens.

He has no sudden epiphany of this. Time passes, as it does. His cinnamon loaf survives. His fig cakes do not. Solas indulges in the heady rush of new feelings. Admiration, and the pleasure of being admired in return. His smiles come more readily. A hand to the shoulder, once a rare comfort, is offered more freely throughout the day. The sounds of laughter readily fill up the shop.

Joy can be strangely infectious.

Abelas stills thinks they are not quite suited to one another, but in an imperfect world he supposed ‘not quite suited’ is still better than many can hope for. And it is difficult to find fault in something that brings a friend happiness, apart from the knowledge that such happiness will eventually fade into sorrow when the infatuation burns itself out, and leaves both parties hollow and listless in its wake.

A few weeks into the affair, he is about close shop when the bell rings.

It is the woman – the dark-haired human one, the same as before – again.

“Did I make it in time?” she wonders.

He blinks.

“Time for what?” he asks.

Not that any of them have a wealth of it left to them, now.

“Before you actually close. Or did you forget to turn the sign again?”

She smiles a little, as she speaks. It changes her face considerably. Unsmiling she is as severe and grounded as any ancient warrior might be expected to seem. There is an old look to her features. Not aged, or weathered, but rather heralding from days when different aesthetics were held in esteem. Yet when she smiles, the landscape of her features change. 

Less the warrior, and more the saint, he thinks. Benevolence over steel.

“We are still technically open,” he concedes.

“Good,” she declares, drawing in a deep breath and then settling her shoulders back. “I would like to order one of your bagels. Plain, if you please. And do not tell anyone I was here.”

That is a surprise.

He raises his eyebrow, but fetches the requested bagel. In light of his duties to the shop, he can do no less.

“Why do you require secrecy?” he wonders, as he rings up the purchase.

She huffs.

“I would simply prefer it not be known,” she declares. “My employer has… opinions on such things.”

“Your employer is entangled in an ill-fated tryst with my own. I should think she would only approve of you patronizing his shop,” he reasons.

The woman – he has forgotten her name, he realizes – snorts, but then narrows her eyes at him.

“Ill-fated?” she asks, as her bagel goes cold. No one appreciates food as they should, these days. It is wolfed down hungrily, or discarded with abandon. Rarely savoured as it should be, with patience and long delight in each mouthful. Consideration for the medley and mingling of flavours.

“Of course. Or do you imagine they could sustain such a reckless and hasty fling, considering their differences?” he wonders.

“Why should they not?” the woman counters, with a surprising degree of heat. Her eyes spark. The wrapper around her bagel crinkles. “Lavellan is not a frivolous woman, and from what I have seen of Solas, he does not strike me as the type to take another’s feelings lightly. Just because affection can strike up swiftly, that does not mean it isn’t  _genuine.”_

He blinks, slightly taken aback by her fervour.

But in fast-paced and frivolous times, he supposes people have learned to favour fast-paced and frivolous feelings, as well.

He mourns for the death of real romance.

“No true depth can exist without time spent cultivating it,” he reasons. “And they are too different. There would never be enough time. Solas is a visionary. Your… Lavellan, is-”

“Careful what you say about my friend,” she warns him.

“Content,” he decides.

They stare at one another for a long moment. The woman’s eyes remained narrowed on him, as she leans back slightly, and at last takes a bite of her bagel. She chews slowly, assessing either himself, or the mouthful of food, or the idea he has presented her with. Or all three.

“They are good for one another,” she at last declares.

“Yes,” he agrees.

It is his own turn to be surprising, it seems.

He turns away, and sets about cleaning off the counter.

“Even fleeting things have their benefits, I suppose. Whatever misery may come of it in the end… I am gratified to see him happy, for now.”

The woman makes an odd sound, caught between agreement and disapproval.

“We shall see what comes of it. Misery is no more guaranteed than happiness.”

“It is, in my experience, far likelier,” he asserts.

Something almost like understanding flits through her gaze. There, and then gone again in a flash.

“We shall see,” she reiterates, before she turns to leave the shop. She flips the sign for him, just as she had that first night, and then pauses at the threshold.

“Tell no one I was here,” she asks him once more.

“I see no reason to,” he agrees.

It is not as if anyone will ever think to ask him. So few people bother speaking to him at all.

~

The woman returns.

In evenings when he works late, it is not uncommon for her to stop by and purchase an unadorned bagel. Her order never varies. He would think she was taking the time to examine the base recipe for merit before investigating the options for accompaniments, in some tentative approximation of true culinary discretion, but that it is likely affording her too much credit.

She is, more probably, a simple creature of basic tastes. Unpretentious, at least. And she offers him no condescension whenever she happens to find him mourning the results of another failed recipe.

Her nose crinkles at the disastrous butter tarts, still oozing their failure onto an inadequately crafted baking sheet. The shop smells of burnt butter. The scent of failure and misery, pervasive and fitting as it seeps into the very walls themselves. But it earns no comment from her.

Her eyebrow lifts at the collapsed soufflé, its recipe too light for the burdens of this world. Yet this, too, does not seem to merit disdain.

Upon sighting his shattered and inedible sugar cookies, she only shrugs, and then helps him gather the pieces into the dismal mire of the trash can. There to be sealed away and carted off in the morning by the roaring trucks that ferry the waste of the masses throughout the city, only to deposit it in overflowing landfills that mar whatever meager beauty the world can still offer.

As he pauses to lament this reality, her brows furrow at him.

“You look like you could use a break,” she observes.

“I will sleep soon,” he replies. Not that sleep offers much reprieve for him. Still, he has been awake for several days now, and it is possible that his body has tired enough to show the need for it.

“No. I mean, you look like you need to do something different for a while,” the woman clarifies, shaking her head at him. “I don’t think I have ever seen you anywhere besides this shop. Not that there’s anything wrong with being dedicated. But what do you do for fun?”

“I find little enjoyment in the shallow frivolities this city has to offer,” he informs her.

She nods at him, and shifts her stance slightly.

“I have never been much for shallow frivolities myself. But everyone needs a break from time to time. Even I take them, though if you ask my friends, not often enough,” she replies.

A creature of duty, then. Or whatever meager understanding a human can afford such notions.

Still. There is a kernel of truth in her words. He had thought himself past the point of being able to derive even the simplest of joys from existence. But that is… permitted to change, perhaps. He is here, after all, and he has come here to try and make some fashion of a life for himself. If it is possible. The philosophy that work and duty must be mitigated by pleasure is an old and reliable one, and it has proven itself irrefutable on many occasions.

Though he doubts Kirkwall, or any of its residents, could actually offer him anything of appeal.

Still.

He has been surprised before.

“What would you suggest?” he wonders.

The woman shrugs.

“I am meeting a few friends for drinks. Conversation, that sort of thing. You are welcome to come along,” she offers.

Socializing?

“No thank you,” he replies.

To her credit, she only nods, and accepts his refusal at face value.

“If you change your mind, we meet at the Hanged Man most weeks. I will not claim that we have no… disreputable sorts among our company, but most of them know Solas now, and are decent enough to be at least somewhat respectful towards a friend of a friend. The place is not much to look at. But the conversation is good, and it can be relaxing,” she informs him.

He fails to see how a hovel filled with drunken rabble could ever be called ‘relaxing’. The uncluttered, meager expanse of his living quarters would, at least, offer more peace than such a place. But the offer is kindly meant, and so he does not sneer, but rather nods in acceptance of it.

She leaves him be.

Whether it is because of this conversation, or the way in which Solas turns an unfamiliar key between his fingers the next day, or how the spirit waif has begun to smile more often, and speak more clearly and readily… he cannot say. Yet, his mind turns over the concept of happiness. Again and again, like a worry stone between his palms.

A thing he long ago set aside. Because it seemed to have become too utterly lost to regain.

And yet.

If he can find it once more… even in small amounts, or unlikely places…

It has always, perhaps, been a treasure worth seeking.

That evening, he tries a new recipe. Mixed berries instead of ones long extinct, and a lighter pastry to produce a single, golden pie, which smells like warm summer evenings, and something like but not quite like what might fill up the old stone kitchens of a long-ago temple. He pulls it carefully from the ovens, and makes up the last batch of bagels for the evening while it cools, off to the side.

Shortly before closing, he packs it into one of the flimsy cake boxes; a meager barrier between it and the elements of the world. But, with luck, enough to suffice.

The woman arrives just as he closes the box.

She buys her bagel.

He slides the box across the counter towards her, once their transaction is complete.

She blinks at it.

“What is this?” she wonders.

“A gift,” he replies. “I do not know if it will be to your liking, but it may suit.”

Her gaze turns back up towards him; quizzical, but not unnerved. After a second she reaches over and opens the box, and examines the contents.

“You made me a pie?” she asks.

“It is an experiment,” he declares. “The recipe is a new one.”

One of her eyebrows quirks upwards.

“Do you always feed acquaintances your ‘experimental’ baking?”

She sounds rather more certain of what is going on, now, despite the question in her tone.

“No,” he declares. “This, too, is an experiment. I had considered what once made me happy. It has been a long time, but… doing things for others used to. Frivolous things. Making gifts or lending help. You prompted me to consider renewing the practice. And so it seemed fitting to extend my first effort towards you.”

Whatever certainty she had thought she had acquired of the situation, it goes flying away once more at that. She blinks, rapidly, and looks down at the pie, as if the shape of it might have somehow been changed by his explanation. In a sense, perhaps it has been.

Carefully, she closes the box again.

When she looks back up at him, there is an unexpected gentleness to her gaze. It has much the same effect on her face as her smile.

So strange, he thinks, that even in this dour setting, a single set of features can hold a surprising degree of nuance.

But perhaps, on some level, the problem is within himself as much as it is within the world around him. Like a diner with an over-saturated palate, it is possible he has lost some ability to discern the subtleties of the world around him.

“I also enjoy doing things for other people,” the woman – and now he finds himself somewhat annoyed that he has forgotten her name – tells him. “Perhaps I might make you something in return?”

“It would be unnecessary. Such compensation was not the point of this endeavour,” he tells her.

“But would you accept it?” she presses.

Her gaze is earnest, straightforward and unflinching. She would take either answer in stride, he thinks. But one might annoy her more than the other, and he finds himself uncommonly reluctant to sour her mood. The point of gifts, of help, is to derive joy from other people’s relief and happiness. Irritation would diminish that.

“I would,” he decides.

The woman’s mouth curls upwards, and she nods, clearly satisfied by that answer.

“Good,” she declares, as she sweeps up the box. “In that case, thank you very much for you gift. I am quite interested in trying it.”

He inclines his head.

She pauses, just before she reaches the door.

“Did it work?” she asks him.

“Did what work?” he wonders, as she shifts the pie box so she can flip the sign on the door for him.

“Your experiment. Did it make you happy?” she wonders. Her gaze flits across his expression, softening again.

He finds it difficult to hold, for some reason. His own eyes slip away, down towards the freshly cleaned countertop. Beneath the glass, the unsold baked goods of the day sit. Tomorrow they will either be sold at a reduced price, or else vanish. Likely thrown into the trash. Their potential wasted, the effort poured into making them rendered meaningless and futile. Like so many other things.

But tonight, the kitchens smell of almost-familiar pies, and he has made something that will, he thinks, be appreciated.

“Somewhat,” he decides.

The woman tips her head in acknowledgement.

“Then, that is a start,” she tells him.

A start.

But of what, he wonders, as she slips back onto the street.


	2. Reading

Abelas watches as a customer drops a slice of fig tart, barely finished, directly into the trash.

The recipe used to create that tart is older than the entirety of the city around them.

Once, it would have graced the plates of high priests and decorated generals. Once, it would have been savoured. Appreciated. Eaten slowly, with an appropriate wine and musical accompaniment; in total silence save for the gentle lilting of the flutes.

And now, it is discarded. Paid for but uneaten.

He takes a moment, and then adds the customer’s description to his ‘Banned Forever’ list.

The day becomes almost intolerable after that point.

Everywhere he looks, he sees evidence of haste. Disdain. Callousness. A lack of appreciation for anything. For everything. The churning hunger of this society turning even its few real accomplishments into heedless fuel for some unobtainable target.

It is a garbage world full of discarded things.

His employer somehow divines the sudden turn of his mood, perhaps channelling the talents of his forebears, or some deep inner understanding of what the world should be, and sends him home early. Though there seems little point in doing much beyond sitting before the stark walls of his living room and contemplating the decline of all things once beautiful and great, this is a world of demands. And failure.

The laundry machine in his building is broken.

His clothes are more soiled than not, and he is swiftly running short of clean attire. Unacceptable. 

There are facilities, of course, where one may rent machines for the purpose of cleaning their belongings. Ungodly monstrosities that churn and roar, struggling as if to pull themselves from the very bindings of their own weight. As if aware of the abysmal nature of their own existence; battering the dirt from cheaply made vestments, that serve little purpose beyond keeping the barest elements at bay. And even then, they are often insufficient to the task.

Nevertheless. Laundry must be done.

Abelas takes the articles most in need of cleaning, and the extra time he has been afforded, and proceeds to the laundromat across the street. Bright lights glare at him, as if seeking to blind all who enter the building. Given the atrocity of its machines and the unsightliness of its wallpaper, perhaps the impulse is driven by pity.

It is not crowded, at least.

He fills up the machine, applies the necessary alchemic ingredients to the process, and then gingerly sits upon one of the plastic chairs nearby.

There are magazines, offered up as tentative distractions. Wards against the consuming roar and clang resounding beside him. He reaches for one. Stares at the glossy tributes to vanity. The grasping attempts at artificially creating a type of beauty that once flowed through the world in endless abundance. Vivid eyes, gleaming smiles, toned muscles, models drenched in golden dust and whirling fabrics, all stare back at him. Unwittingly mocking what they seek to embody.

After a few minutes, he abandons them, and slumps. Artificial beauty on flimsy paper covers. Stained, mustard yellow walls. This world makes tortuous prisons of everything.

“Abelas?”

He blinks.

The voice which calls to him is one that has become familiar. Its owner stands by the entryway, basket in hand, and for a moment, the sight of her face is… oddly relieving. The surprise of seeing her is not unpleasant. It is the human woman from the shop across the street. Removed from her typical environs. Clad in a sapphire jacket that may as well be a solitary gemstone tossed into the sewer of this heinous laundromat.

He shakes the errant thought away. It is strange. The make of her jacket is no finer than any other he has seen in recent days.

“It is you,” he greets.

It is… possible that he has still not been able to ascertain her name.

She is a carrying a laundry basket, which she shifts against her hip, before approaching one of the machines.

“This is a surprise,” she declares. “I did not realize we used the same laundromat. Funny that we have not bumped into one another sooner.”

“It is a recent development. The machines in my building are broken,” he explains.

“Ah,” she says, then nods; satisfied by this explanation.

He finds himself watching her, somewhat, as she deposits her clothing into the waiting mouths of the machines. Pre-sorted, it seems, so that she can act with efficiency. It takes her far less time than it had taken him to be done with the task, and he considers the merits of planning ahead in such a way himself. Perhaps some of the appalling tedium of this world can be mitigated, when it is properly anticipated.

Once the machines are roaring, the woman slides into the chair one over from his own.

“I appreciated the falafel you gave me last week,” he informs her. “The vivid colour of the interior was a pleasant surprise. As was the taste.”

She smiles.

“I am pleased to hear it,” she declares. 

Leaning over, she glances at the glossy publication resting, mostly forgotten, upon his lap.

“Do you… often read Seventeen Magazine?” she asks him. There is a faint note of amusement in her voice.

Ah.

The last magazine he had taken up is a publication meant for youths, it seems. Though no one in this world every truly has much chance to reach adulthood.

…Then again, he would hesitate to describe the woman beside him as immature, in any sense. 

“It was on the table,” he simply says, as he returns it to its place of origins.

“I was not criticizing,” she insists, raising a hand. “Waiting here can be very dull.”

Dull, and unpleasant. He agrees. If the decor and the sounds were not bad enough, the oppressive smell would be. It seems a scent designed wholly out of malice, to drive the air downwards, and fill all who partake of it with an undeniable sense of futility. Like a seeping bog, leeching purpose with every stale exhalation, leaving behind a hard knot of frustration to worm its way into the depths of one’s chest.

There to spread poison with each continued moment of inactivity. Stifling, and yet not perilous enough to merit abandoning the task.

“Forgive me if this is impertinent,” the woman beside him says. “But are you alright? You seem… uncommonly morose.”

Does he?

Perhaps he is better at maintaining appearances at most times than he had thought. Though, upon consideration, this is a… particularly dour outlook for him, at the moment. Especially given the unexpected equilibrium he has managed to achieve of late.

“It has been a trying day,” he concedes.

She nods in acceptance, brushing a hand over the back of her neck.

“Customers?” she asks.

He turns more fully towards her, somewhat surprised at her insight.

“Indeed,” he agrees. “I find them most difficult to comprehend, at times.”

“If only people felt obliged to make sense more often,” she muses, settling back into her chair.

One of her feet brushes against the empty laundry basket she had settled beside herself. It skids towards him across the peeled and stained flooring, a blur of cheerful yellow. A worn paperback novel rattles inside. The edges of it have peeled backwards. The front cover is cracked, splitting the image of a warrior woman sporting sword and shield and inadequate armour - challenging onlookers with a fiery gaze.

Hastily, the woman drags the basket back over to herself.

“It is one of the Varric’s books,” she says. “I read them, sometimes. Only because Varric is my friend.”

The wear to the book tells another story.

He raises his eyebrows. For a woman of some apparent integrity, the pettiness of the lie is unbecoming.

“If you say so,” he replies.

She sighs.

“ _And_  I… enjoy them. Somewhat,” she concedes.

“This embarrasses you?” he wonders. Such a thing, to be ashamed of the very arts that move one towards feeling.

“Have you ever read one of Varric’s books?” she asks.

“No,” he admits.

She snorts.

“They are - they appeal to certain base qualities in people. Not that there is anything wrong with that, I suppose. But I would hesitate to claim that enjoying one of his stories is  _dignified_. Enthralling, perhaps. Riveting, even. But not precisely something one wishes to shout from the rooftops.” 

“Ah,” he says, simply. 

It still does not make much sense to him. But then, too, so few things really do anymore. 

Silence falls between them. Not precisely uncomfortable, though perhaps a little awkward. After a moment the woman pulls out her phone. He braces himself for an inevitable jangling of sounds; but apart from the occasional vibration, the device remains silent. 

She glances over at him, a few times, as he sits and contemplates the tackiness of the laundromat floor. 

“Here,” she offers, at length; snatching up her paperback and extending it towards him. “It is more entertaining than Seventeen Magazine, at least. Or the walls. I hope.” 

He hesitates, a moment, and then accepts the offering, and the good intentions with which it has been extended towards him. The book is no leather-bound tome or delicate manuscript, and it has scarcely been tended to in an appropriate fashion. But there is obviously affection for the object in her. 

He handles the pages with care. 

Some are dog-eared, and in certain places it seems she has even crossed out lines she fines distasteful. The story’s protagonist grasps a bar patron by the collar in the first chapter, and accuses him of acting like a ‘drunken mabari bitch’. The praise has been penciled out. There is an erased note in the margins. Not enough left of it for him to read what she wrote, but he catches the beginning of the author’s name, and something was underlined heavily enough to indent the page. 

He finds himself more intrigued by her obvious interactions with the book than by the story itself. The prose is easily read, at least. It lacks adornment, or much in the way of ceremony or symbolism. But it conveys the tale, which he supposes is the point, and more flavour and context of emotion is added by the clues its owner has left behind. He notices that the book’s spine mostly easily opens to pages where it seems a kiss is occurring. 

Though the narrative does not extend far beyond these casual acts of intimacy. It sways away from the details of coitus, and Abelas finds himself glad for that. He doubts the author could do justice to the dance of bodies caught within the rapturous throws of such an act. Like everything else, it would probably be hasty and unbefitting. Lacking in the thorough steps of intimacy. The radiant care of two forms meeting, entwining, exploring… 

The woman sitting next to him begins to speak. 

He finds himself startled, as if he somehow has been caught doing something untoward. But she is only speaking on her phone, now, in a low voice. Telling someone she is at the laundromat. He watches her a moment, and then turns back to the pages of the book. To some sort of crime scene, where hideous people have done hideous things, and there is no need to reminisce upon matters of softness or sensuality. 

He stops when his machines do, and moves his clothing into one of the roaring dryers. When he comes back, he takes up the book again. Inspiration strikes him, briefly, and he checks the back cover. 

Sure enough, in scrawling penmanship, there is the author’s signature. 

‘To my dear friend Cassandra, who adores my writing so very, very much’ the line says, beneath the nearly illegible marking that is ostensibly a name. 

Cassandra. 

Abelas lets out a breath, and feels a rare trill of satisfaction. He has found her name, and without the possible discourtesy of letting her know that he forgot it in the first place. As he turns back towards another spot in the book – chosen more for the wealth of footnotes which have not been subjected to clumsy erasers than anything else – his lips curl upwards, just slightly. 

“Do you – do you like it, then?” Cassandra asks him. 

His gaze snaps up, and he discovers that she has finished with her quiet conversation. She is looking at him with something approaching hesitancy. One of her hands fiddles with the tattered edges of the chair she is sitting upon. The gesture is far softer, far smaller than the ones he is accustomed to seeing from her. 

She has exposed a vulnerability, he realizes. Someone has mocked her for this interest. Or perhaps the ceaseless voices of this world’s overriding norms, spewing vitriol and foolishness at every possible opportunity, has done enough on its own. 

“I like it,” he says, inclining his head. 

Perhaps not for its own sake. But the stifling misery in him has abated somewhat. He can credit this distraction for that; and so it is enough, he thinks, to claim approval. 

Cassandra smiles at him. Not a small smile, either. Her lips part to reveal the white pearls of her teeth, and she raises a hand, as if to cover it or gesture somehow, perhaps. The movement is swiftly aborted, however. She turns to face him more fully in her seat. 

“There are more,” she tells him. “This is my favourite one, but, that is mostly because it is after the trial – I spend the books before the trial always worrying, even though I know it turns out for the best. What part did you like? Oh, but, you have not finished. The ending is the best bit. Well, in my opinion. Though, I did quite like the part where she got the drop on those lyrium smugglers.” 

Her enthusiasm is stunning. 

Abelas marvels at it, a moment. To take so much from so few and simple words. But there was a time when that was not an uncommon sight to see. When but a single line of poetry could move great elders to tears. When the young and passionate would write sheaf after sheaf of their thoughts and ideals and feelings. When their peers would clutch their written words in hand, and raise them up, and feel inspired. 

Much has changed, he thinks, in a sudden moment of epiphany. Much has changed. Languages, and culture, and magic, and the make of the world itself. But words. Even words spoken in a different tongue… they are the same. Ink upon page. Ideas bigger than spirits bound in a few simple lines and symbols. 

“I liked the part where they went on a picnic,” he decides. “Before the bandits interrupted.” 

Cassandra’s cheeks darken, just slightly. She makes the same aborted movement with her hand. Her smile does not abate; though her lips twitch, as if it is attempting to. She clears her throat, and her eyes dart about their decrepit surroundings. As if she fears being overheard. 

“I like that part, too,” she confesses. 

His dryer clatters to a halt, then. 

Abelas turns towards it, confirming that it has finished its allotted time, and not simply expired as the worn and wretched composite parts of it finally abandoned their task. But no. The timer has run down, and his clothes have finished their cleaning. He is free from the prison of the laundromat. 

Turning back towards Cassandra, he extends the book. 

“Thank you for loaning me the use of it,” he says. 

She glances down towards the cover, and hesitates to retake it. 

“You could keep it a while longer,” she suggests. “Until you finish it, at least. The end really is the best part.” 

There is something tentative to the air. Perhaps he is imagining. Or perhaps he is manufacturing it. Pulling it from the tattered remnants of old memories. In forging some stray connection here, it is possible his mind is simply colouring the atmosphere with shades of what it might expect to find. But either way, for a moment, and given the day he has had, it is… welcome. He pulls the book back towards himself, and inclines his head in thanks. 

“It shall be well looked-after until I return it to you,” he promises. 

Cassandra nods in acknowledgement. 

“If you wish to talk, about the book… sometimes it is hard to find people. There is an internet forum I go to, but, I would be willing to chat. Just. Whenever,” she offers. 

“Thank you,” he says, again. 

Discourse. 

He used to engage in it much more frequently than he does now. Debates, and critical examinations of texts, and lore, and contradictory accounts of historical events, and religious doctrine.  There is still some to be had, at times. But reciting old debates and interpretations to his employer has always lacked a certain quality of satisfaction. He had assumed that quality lost forever, like so many things.

Perhaps, though, it is worth pursuing other avenues towards it. If only for the chance.

After a moment, he stands, and goes to retrieve his clothes. The laundromat remains a hideous trial, and testament to the ugliness of this world. 

But outside, the air is… much clearer. 


End file.
